Also this issue: Diesel Dork Anti-folk hero Adam Brodsky returns from touring with a new CD and an all-star cast to play the release party. -M.J. Fine Back Again Singer/actor Jimi Mooney's punk-princess alter ego finds love as Helen Back. -A.D. Amorosi The Slats -Patrick Rapa Brother JT -Brian Howard Luciana Souza -A.D. Amorosi Billy Joe Shaver -Sam Adams The Swords Project/ The Gloria Record -A.D. Amorosi DJ Nights -Sean O'Neal

November 27-December 3, 2002

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Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers

Maybe Tom Petty isn't biting the hand that feeds him, but he's growling at it pretty good. The Last DJ (Warner Brothers) isn't quite a concept album, but a lot of its songs hammer at the same note: Record companies, music promoters and radio stations are corporate monsters more interested in pushing product than exposing talent. No, seriously. Petty works up a good head of steam on the title track -- "All the boys upstairs want to see/ How much you'll pay/ For what you used to get for free" -- and "Joe," an acid-tongued portrait of a record company CEO on the lookout for the next "angel whore/ who can learn a guitar lick." But the same song's "Go get me a kid/ With a good-looking face" is just Neil Young's "Crime in the City" without the context, and Petty's so intent on conveying his contempt that he overemotes like a pissed-off Meat Loaf. Plus, you have to imagine the fine folks at Warner Brothers and Clear Channel don't give a shit what Petty says as long as he keeps making them money. That's not to say he has to drop his next CD on Jade Tree and start playing high school gyms, but Petty might want to try nibbling on his own knuckles for a spell.

Tue., Dec. 3, 7:30 p.m., $29.50-$55, with Jackson Browne, The Spectrum, Broad St. and Pattison Ave., 215-336-2000.

—Sam Adams